


She Has the Measure of You

by Sekxtion



Series: All Sins, Half Truths, and No Morals [1]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Backstory, F/F, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-08
Updated: 2016-12-08
Packaged: 2018-09-07 07:35:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,580
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8789227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sekxtion/pseuds/Sekxtion
Summary: Fareeha Amari is dispatched by the re-formed Overwatch to retrieve Doctor Angela Ziegler from Tikrit, Iraq.  
Angela takes a journey down memory lane.





	

“Doctor.”

Of course it’d be Fareeha Amari that Winston would send to personally entreat her to join the re-formed Overwatch. 

She had hoped that merely not responding to the recall would be the end of it, but she had known better; it would be unlike Winston to let things lay as they were.  It made her smile in a rueful way, the expression not quite reaching her eyes as she surveyed the winsome, decorated soldier before her, so far removed from the little girl cum young woman she remembered her being. 

 

The voice is warm honey trickled over poisonous words, “Will you return, Doctor?  Overwatch, and the world, needs you once more.”

/ / / / /

He was cunning, was Winston.  He always had been. 

When Angela had raced after nanobiotic medical landmarks at the expense of sleep, of consuming anything other than coffee and stim-sticks, when Jesse would find her glassy-eyed and borderline non-responsive in her office, suffering from increasingly frequent bouts of microsleep, it had been Winston that took the unilateral step of just killing power to the Medical Lab (after ensuring he had saved her work, of course; he was a scientist, not some luddite).

Angela had been furious, of course, even in the face of his calm explanations and detailed rationale.  Faced with the normally stoic doctor moved to incandescent rage (McCree had once described Angela in full swing as ‘a storm given flesh and a heartbeat’), Winston had done what anyone would: he had unleashed Ana on her.  Rather than try to reason Angela out of a position that Angela had not bothered to reason herself _in_ to, Ana (ever the pragmatic sort) had shrugged and shot Angela with a tranquilizer dart. 

When Angela had regained consciousness three days later, hooked up to an IV drip and temporary feeding tube, Ana explained that if Angela were to so cavalierly risk her health, and by virtue of her position as Head Medical Doctor, her agent’s health, in such a manner ever again, the same treatment would be repeated with disciplinary actions to follow.

To ensure the Doctor would rectify this shortcoming in her behavior, Ana had assigned Fareeha to be Angela’s ‘helper’ (read: spy).  At first Angela had resented the presence of her little keeper, but had, over time, warmed up to Fareeha’s presence and taken her under her wing, reasoning that if Fareeha was to be assigned as her helper she should act the part. 

Days were spent teaching Fareeha how to decant, prepare microscope slides, use the Universal Constructor (with proper supervision) to fabricate new batches of nanites for testing with the Caduceus Delivery System, and even do basic (and not-so-basic) first aid as various Overwatch agents stumbled in to the infirmary with their myriad injuries, both mission-related and not. 

She had never been given to overt displays of affection or even sought the attention of others, preferring to let her work stand on its own without messy interpersonal contact.  Fareeha had been different.  When the Doctor forgot to eat, Fareeha brought her meals to the lab (but never into their workspace, that would be unsanitary).  When Angela was stumped by yet another hiccup in the implementation of the Einherjar Protocol, Fareeha would quietly set out the chessboard and lead the Doctor into a game, the only noise the measured _clack_ of the pieces across the polished board.  When Angela was withdrawn (bouts of depression had always plagued her, even into adulthood), Fareeha would draw her out with inquiries and ideas for future applications for Angela’s nanobiotics. 

It had, in fact, been Fareeha who had given Angela the idea for the damage boosting nanite treatment now built into the Caduceus.  Fareeha’s mind was nimble and exceptionally shrewd, and as befitted a child of a soldier who was raised by soldiers, she was also unexcitable and atypically (for her age), sensible.  Fareeha had cared for the Doctor just as Angela had seen to Fareeha’s continued education and sought to encourage her to go forth and slake her thirst for self-fulfillment.

It was Angela that Fareeha had first come out to in her early teenage years.  Angela had quietly confessed that she was gay as well.  She had reassured the girl, already so unsure of herself (hormones were brutally unfair to all teenagers, but especially young women) and her place in the world, that while Angela was not in all respects normal, that Fareeha’s sexual inclinations _were_.  The young girl (more of a woman now than anything else) had crawled into Angela’s lap and cried quiet tears of relief.  Ordering Athena to lock the door to the infirmary barring an immediate medical emergency, Angela had rocked Fareeha in the glow of monitors displaying nanite reproduction curves and limbic system response analyses.

In light of Ana’s hesitance to admit Fareeha as an Overwatch recruit on her eighteenth birthday, it had been Angela that suggested she join the Egyptian Expeditionary Forces.  The suggestion (whether it was because it neatly circumvented her mother or because Fareeha had loved her for her support despite Angela’s avowed pacifism) had netted Angela the first kiss of her adult life.

The night of Fareeha’s departure for basic training had seen the Doctor and the would-be soldier sharing quiet goodbyes in the hangar.  Fareeha had snapped a picture of the two of them, Angela in her burgundy slacks and ever-present lab coat, Fareeha in khaki cargo pants and a black tank top.  Fareeha had made her promise to be safe since she would no longer be there to watch over and take care of Angela, and Angela had (unexpectedly even to herself) set the picture as the background on her battered dataslate and firmly pressed three ampules of Einherjar-enabled, one-time use nanobiotic injectors into Fareeha’s hand.

Angela wasn’t good at interpersonal anything other than the requisite bedside manner expected of her as a doctor, let alone telling someone that she loves them, but giving someone your life’s work should count.  

She hopes.

In the semi-darkness of the hangar, Fareeha’s dusky complexion flushes and she kisses Angela for the second time.  Angela is so relieved the plates of her spinal implant feather themselves.  The sensation prickles her skin.

/ / / / /

Now, Winston has sent the only person that she has ever been unable to say ‘no’ to, to usher her back into the fold. 

In spite of the intervening ten years, Angela finds that nothing has changed in that regard.  Fareeha’s warm, brown eyes, proud bearing (even when she had been a child she had carried herself well, so eager to follow after her mother in all regards), and earnest plea has Angela packing her kit and Valkyrie suit for transport before her mind has caught up to her hands.

Caduceus design schematics and notes, emergency first aid kit (nanobiotics not included), two changes of clothes, toiletries, an entire box of granola bars, and a battered copy of _The Raw Shark Texts_ disappear into her worn satchel.  The Valkyrie and its attendant Caduceus Staff tuck neatly into their case.  Last, her blaster slips into the drop holster strapped to her thigh. 

Kitbag slung over her shoulder and rolling Pelican case full of million-dollar combat hardsuit so prepared, Angela turns back to the pleasantly surprised soldier.  Fareeha smiles at her, the expression wide, teeth bright against tanned skin. 

Angela rolls her eyes and unashamedly snorts, “I have no idea why you’re surprised I said yes.  You’ve always been the burr in my armour.  If Winston had sent anyone else, they’d be leaving disappointed.”

Somehow, Fareeha manages to grin wider, “Then I suppose the world should count itself lucky that he _did not_ send anyone else.” 

“Indeed.  So what do I call you now?  Captain?  Major?  I admit that I have not kept up with your military career, other than to ensure you were still alive.”  The confession causes Angela’s milk-white complexion to flush pink, “You may recall I’m not…good…at…”, a nervous motion of her hands, “…people.  I am…unchanged in that regard.”

Fareeha’s expression sobers at that and she steps closer, enclosing Angela’s nervously flitting hands inside of her own calloused ones.  This close, Angela realizes how small she is next to the muscled Egyptian and wonders, if her heart still beat, would it speed up right now? 

Fareeha tilts Angela’s head up to look in her eyes, “It is Captain, yes.  And I have not forgotten anything about you, Doctor.  And as always, you should offer no apologies for who you are.”  A pause, “I have never sought change from you.  I have always been quietly amazed at who you are.”

 

For a second, Angela quite forgets how to breathe.  Fareeha smiles gently and pulls the Doctor into her body, wrapping her arms around the smaller woman’s frame.  She smells of spices and sweat, jet fuel and gun powder.  Angela closes her eyes and basks in all that is Fareeha Amari. 

Too soon the moment is over and Fareeha steps away.  Angela gives a slight shake of her shoulders before blinking in the sunlight.  She looks up at Fareeha, “Shall we go then, Captain Amari?” Angela holds open the flap of the _MSF_ tent.  In the distance, Tikrit bakes in the noonday sun.

Fareeha slips a battered pair of aviator sunglasses over her eyes and Angela quietly mourns.  The Egyptians reaches down and effortless drags the rolling armour case out of the tent before reaching back to hold the flap for Angela.

“We shall, Doctor.  The others are waiting.”

**Author's Note:**

> Pharmercy is OTP. 
> 
> In my mind, Angela has shut herself off from most interpersonal contact due to the trauma of losing so many of the people she cared about in Overwatch, and before that her parents and family. This, plus (in my head) Angela being on the spectrum somewhere, means Angela is very alone.
> 
> Fareeha is the burr in that defense, and Angela is in no rush to change that.
> 
> Einherjar as the term for Angela's resurrection ability is shamelessly cribbed from the brilliant FaustianFantasy and his story "Better". Read it. It's fantastic.


End file.
